ABSTRACT
This chapter explains Failure of a Therapeutic Assessment. Finn and Tonsager (1997) defined one instance of failure in Therapeutic Assessment as when the client feels "less capable, demoralized, and even abused after the assessment". In Therapeutic Assessment, when we invite clients to pose questions to be addressed by the assessment, we should not assume that they are open to all possible answers to such questions. The transferences, countertransferences, and attachments formed in these encounters are extremely intense; it is partly due to this fact that Therapeutic Assessment can be so powerfully beneficial. But for these same reasons, the techniques of Therapeutic Assessment are also potentially harmful, and should be practiced in certain instances only with the support and assistance of others. Therapeutic Assessment, because of the brief and powerful connections formed between assessors and clients, is often too difficult to do without the assessor having the backing and collaboration of a community of skilled and savvy colleagues.
